Geriatrics

One of the things I learned during my 2022 hospital stay at St. Joseph's is that medical staff there are not educated regarding the latest in geriatrics, in particular the safe and effective use of opioids in treating geriatric diseases involving severe chronic pain. Luckily for me, my former primary sent my swab to GeneSight laboratory to determine which opioids are compatible with my DNA. Neither the doctors nor nurses at St. Joseph's had ever heard of such a test, which I had done five years ago. 

According to the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine, the healthcare workforce lacks the capacity to meet the needs of older patients. To remedy this would require a ten-fold increase in trained staff, which the medical industry neglects for financial reasons, leaving Americans with one of the worst healthcare systems in the world. 

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